What Transmittable Diseases Do Raccoons Carry?
Sure, the trash pandas are adorable. Everyone loves their tiny little hands!
Yet when coons get too close, disease can follow.
In fact, raccoons carry so many diseases that we'd be hard pressed to name them all. Still, we can give you the most common ones.
Leptospirosis
What it is: a bacterial disease that affects humans and animals.
What it does: causes kidney damage, meningitis, liver failure, and respiratory distress. In short, leptospirosis can be fatal.
How raccoons pass it on to us: through urine contamination.
Rabies
What it is: a viral disease that infects the central nervous system of both humans and animals.
What it does: causes severe inflammation of the brain and spinal cord. It's most famous for turning animals dangerously aggressive; humans can end up in a state of anxiety, confusion, or partial paralysis. Humans can also suffer from hallucinations. It even can cause a severe fear of water: individuals will panic and refuse to drink.
The virus essentially hijacks the brain.
How raccoons pass it to us: through bites and scratches.
Canine Distemper
What it is: a virus that attacks the respiratory, gastrointestinal, and nervous system of dogs.
What it does: causes a watery, pus-like discharge from the eyes. As the disease progresses, dogs develop fevers, nasal discharge, coughing, lethargy, a reduced appetite, vomiting, seizures, partial or complete paralysis. This disease is often fatal. Even when it isn't it can cause permanent, irreparable nervous system damage.
How raccoons pass it to your animals: through direct contact with body fluids or droppings.
Raccoon Parvoviral Enteritis
What it is: a highly infectious virus. Racoons can pass it to both dogs and cats.
What it does: causes lethargy, depression, lack of appetite, fever, vomiting, and diarrhea. You may spot mucous or blood in your pet's feces. This disease can be treated if you get your pet to the vet fast enough, but it can be fatal.
How raccoons pass it to your pets: through contact with droppings.
Infectious Canine Hepatitis
What it is: a contagious viral disease that targets dogs.
What it does: this virus targets the spleen, kidneys, lungs, liver, the lining of the blood vessels and other organs. Symptoms can include fever, vomiting, depression and apathy, thirst, loss of appetite, blindness, a swollen belly, jaundice, red dots on the skin, seizures, and other symptoms. This disease can be fatal.
How raccoons pass it to your pets: through contact with raccoon urine, most commonly when dogs drink from an outdoor puddle or stagnant pond.
Toxoplasmosis
What it is: a disease caused by a parasite known as the toxoplasma gondii parasite.
What it does: causes body aches, swollen lymph nodes, headache, fever, and fatigue. May cause severe, even fatal, problems in babies, those infected with HIV/AIDS, or in pregnant people.
How raccoons pass it to us: through contact with urine or feces.
Baylisascaris Procyonis
What it is: a rare but serious roundworm.
What it does: causes neurological and ocular symptoms in humans. Symptoms include nausea, exhaustion, liver enlargement, loss of coordination, confusion, and loss of muscle control. May cause blindness or coma.
How raccoons pass it to us: through contact with urine or feces.
Keep disease out of your home by keeping raccoons out of your home!
While you may imagine that you'd never openly come into contact with urine or feces or get close enough to a raccoon to get bitten by one, the truth is your risk of disease goes up exponentially when a raccoon moves into your home. You may not realize common household surfaces have become contaminated, or that raccoons have been handling your pet's food and water supply.
Protect your home and your family from disease. Call Elite Wildlife for humane raccoon removal. We'll put them somewhere they'll be happier, and we'll keep you safe at the same time.
What You Need to Know About Raccoons
Have you seen a pack of little trash pandas cavorting around your yard? Raccoons can be adorable, but like any wild animals they can bring some trouble!
We've been seeing a lot more raccoons in Sugar Land lately, and so we thought we'd take time to walk you through some of what you need to know if you're seeing raccoons popping up out of your trash cans or staring at you through your windows!
Are raccoons aggressive to humans?
Good news, raccoons are almost never aggressive. If a raccoon attacks a human it's usually because they've gone rabid.
That means if you get attacked by a raccoon you need to get to a hospital right away! There's a good chance you've gotten infected with rabies.
The exception is female raccoons who are defending their young. They might start to exhibit aggressive behavior because they're afraid you'll hurt their babies.
Can you befriend a raccoon?
It's better to avoid trying. Feeding the raccoons puts you at risk for all the diseases they carry and encourages them to move right into your home.
It's also not good for the raccoons. Many raccoons who get euthanized began as racoons that humans tried to befriend. When you habituate raccoons to humans you make them impossible to relocate or put them in a situation where they're going to be euthanized because they are a health risk.
What should you do if you see raccoons in the yard?
If you see raccoons in your yard there's a great chance they've already worked their way into a house. You're seeing them as often as you are because their nest is nearby, and there's a good chance that nest is in your house!
We've already talked about the risk of contracting disease. This risk doesn't just come from raccoon bites! It comes from the fleas that raccoons bring into your house, which jump to you and your pets. It comes from the urine and feces they leave around your home too.
We haven't even talked about the damage they can do to your house, yet.
For example, we've seen them chew their way through roofing, dig their way through insulation, damage ventilation systems, and trash HVAC systems. They like to chew on electrical wires too, which creates a fire risk.
So do the following to prevent any fire risk in your home:
Make sure you've chained up your trash cans and removed other food sources.
Install motion-activated lights to scare raccoons away when they come near the house.
Call a humane pest control company.
Here's how we handle raccoons in Sugar Land, TX and surrounding areas.
We show up at your house and look at all the ways they're getting into your home. Then we gently trap the raccoons and relocate them to a place where they can live without disturbing other humans or destroying delicate ecosystems.
If you want to get close to cute raccoons, head to the zoo! In the meantime, call us to get your home and yard trash panda free.
Feel free to take a look at our reviews and see what our clients have to say about their experience with our company.
Contact us or call (832)727-9181 today for a free consultation.
Bat Removal in The Woodlands
There are ten species of bats inhabiting the Woodlands area:
- The Eastern Red Bat
- The Seminole Bat
- The Hoary Bat
- The Northern Yellow Bat
- The Big Brown Bat
- The Evening Bat
- The Eastern Pipistrelle
- The Silver-Haired Bat
- The Free-tailed Bat
On certain nights in the area you can see hundreds of them taking flight, off to look for food. With so many flitting about it's little wonder that they eventually end up in our homes and businesses.
When they get into buildings they are not harmless. Instead, they cause disease and a great deal of damage to almost any structure they get into. It's important to protect your investments by handling bats the right way.
Here's what you need to know.
Bat Houses Don't Help Prevent Bats
Sorry: you can't keep bats out of your home by building them a more attractive habitat.
Bat houses are certainly a good idea if you want to help threatened bat populations. Bats just can't exercise any discernment that might make them say: oh, that house is for me, so I'll stay out of this person's attic.
Instead, some bats will roost in the bat house and then other bats will arrive. If your home is accessible, some of them will go roost in your attic.
In fact, you should be very careful about putting up a bat house or encouraging bats in any other way if you have not yet taken steps to make your home inaccessible to them.
They Are Gentle and Beneficial When They Stay Outside
You don't want to go the other extreme wherein you start murdering bats with traps and lures and poisons. Bats have a lot going for them.
They eat insects, including mosquitos. They are seed-dispensers and pollinators, which means they're vital to our food-bearing ecosystems. They are gentle little animals and are about as clean as any wild animal ever is.
They're also endangered because a lot of people kill bats thanks to old superstitions that say they're dangerous, aggressive, or evil animals.
We don't want to contribute to their endangerment. We just want to prevent them from doing damage to your home.
Humane Bat Removal Solves the Problem
Here at Elite Wildlife Services, we help the home and business owners in the Woodlands seal off the areas that bats might use to access their homes. We then trap and remove bats safely, putting them somewhere they can do some good while preventing them from doing any more damage.
If you think you might have bats in your home, don't panic, don't reach for poison, and don't waste your money on "bat deterrents" that don't work.
Call us to take them out of your home or office so that you can get back to living a happy, bat-free lifestyle.
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Our goal is to take time to evaluate each customers situation and customize proven results to solve it. If you are looking for a professional solution for your Squirrel Removal needs, please contact us today.
Wildlife Removal in The Woodlands
Many people enjoy living in The Woodlands because it puts them right next door to the 1800-acre George Mitchell Nature Preserve. While you might enjoy being able to spot various creatures when you visit the Preserve, the last place you want them is in your home or business.
It's not unusual for bats, raccoons, grey squirrels, rats, opossums, snakes, bees, and armadillos to become major issues for property owners in The Woodlands area. Each of these creatures threatens your investment in a variety of ways.
They Spread Disease
Every one of these animals carries some form of disease. Bats carry deadly upper respiratory fungal infections. Raccoons carry rabies. Rats carry just about every plague you can think of.
Wildlife in a building poses a severe health and safety risk that you need to address right away.
They Ruin Your Property
Properties in the Woodlands are often beautifully built and appointed. Yet you stand to lose all that if you let wildlife run rampant in your home.
First, there's just no getting around it: animals leave urine and feces everywhere. Bats and rats don't politely go outside or in litter boxes. That means stains, smells, and other damage that can be difficult and expensive to clean up.
Second, many of these creatures like to chew on wires, walls, roofs, soffits, and insulation. It just so happens that our homes and businesses are filled with ideal nesting materials.
Third, pests sometimes attract other pests.
Got rats? Snakes are right behind them, because the snakes feed on the rats. Got bees? Rats and roaches are ready to eat their honey.
They Threaten Your Safety
Sure, most of the snakes that might be found in your Woodlands home are unlikely to be venomous, but snake bites still hurt. Rats will bite, scratch, and spread disease when they feel threatened, and so will any other animal.
Honeybees? Swarms and stings can be deadly if you or anyone on your property is allergic.
The longer you leave these creatures on your property the more likely it is that you're going to have some kind of an encounter with them that could result in someone getting hurt. As they grow more invasive they push further and further into the spaces where humans live and work.
Humane Wildlife Removal Services
There are no DIY solutions that work well for chasing these animals away. The only ways to handle the problem are to find out how they're getting in. Then we have to seal those spaces and remove the animals that are already there.
Killing those animals comes with its own set of problems, including the fact that corpses can become trapped in walls or hard-to-reach attic spaces, creating their own smells, health, and safety issues.
Instead, we trap them and take them off to a place where they can live their little lives in peace while leaving you to yours.
If you know you have a problem, don't delay and don't wait. You've worked too long and too hard to secure your Woodlands property to lose it to these representatives from the great outdoors.
